September 24, 2019

Confluent Raises $125 Million for Open Source Event Streaming

Stream processing – which treats data as a continuous stream of events – is increasingly important to marketers and CDPs. Confluent, whose founders created the open source Apache Kafka streaming data engine, just raised a $125 million Series D, bringing their total to $206 million. It’s yet another example of open source technology in the marketing stack.

Smartphones are the source of many event streams. This study from ad agency Allen & Gerritsen takes a close look at the impact they’re had and the time they consume. Did you know that 71% of Americans sleep with or near their phone? Exciting and scary, to misquote Stephen Sondheim.

Smartphones also raise privacy issues, especially regarding location data. This study from location tech vendor Blis takes a good look at consumer attitudes. Like other studies, it finds about one-third of consumers don’t want to share their data at all and the rest will trade it for discounts or similar benefits, often at a very low price. For example: 70% would let Amazon see their shopping history on competitive sites in return for a discounted shopping cart.

The CDP Institute educates marketers about the issues, methods, and technology used to manage customer data, with a special focus on Customer Data Platforms. Join the CDP Institute for free access to valuable information and insights.